“I’m very sorry, but you will have to pardon me if I refuse to give you a knockdown, for I would steer no friend of a friend of mine up against a flim flam where there’s so many nice girls running loose.  Take Tessie Samonies, for example, she ain’t very pretty, but she’s awfully cute, and after she gets a couple of sloe gins boosted into her she certainly is the life of the party.”

“All right, frame it up for me and I’ll open wine or a window or something to show that I’m a true sport.”

“You bet I will, and we’ll have a nice little family party, no knocking or nothing; just sit and talk real friendly like.”

“That’s the idea and if anyone starts the anvil chorus they get the skiddo.  What?  Who will we have?”

“Well, let’s see, we’ll have Tessie and you, me and Silent Murphy here—­and let’s see who else?”

“Joe Zeweibaum and Miss Veronique.”

“Not yet.  Joe is all right in a crowd if you can keep him from talking about his sales, but the dame—­not for me, for if there’s any one gets my goat she’s it.”

“Shall we have Frank Millar and his first wife?”

“Oh, heavings!  No!  For if we did his third wife would hear about it and then she would knock me to my husband, for you know they are engaged, so if she hears anything about me you can bet she plays it up strong.”

“Well, can’t you think of some one else?”

“No, I don’t know a soul that is any good but us four.  My goodness, I’ve got to roll my hoop and do a shopping number, get my hair gargled—­I slept in it last night—­and see a sick friend.

“Fate sure does sic tribulations on me at every turn of the road.  This business of hunting employment has got to be so balmy that I snort and jump sideways every time anybody says ‘job.’

“Now that the first of the year has kicked in, I thought everything would be as merry as a marriage bell, but as yet there hasn’t been a ripple on the water.  The only thing that acts as a star of hope to my miserable existence is a date with a Summer stock that opens the first of June, and there is a heap of smoke around that.  I wish some one would tip me off to some way of earning an honest living without having to resort to a sock full of sand or a strong arm.  But why be downhearted?  I haven’t drunk up all my Christmas presents yet.  As a last hope I can load upon them and get some kind ambulance to drag me up to the dippy department of some nice hospital.  Honest, I am getting so thin that before long I won’t be able to understudy a drop of water in Mr. Hawk’s Hippodrome.

“A nice gentleman presented himself to me on Broadway the other evening and, after passing the compliments of the season, invited me out to inhale a young table d’hote.  The way I sprang to his side made a leap for life seem like sinful idleness.  And where do you think he took me?  I ask as a friend, Where do you think he took me?  To one of those joints where you get everything from soup